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May 21, 2009

LAO: Quit Messin' Around and Make Some Serious Cuts

This morning the Legislative Analyst’s Office offered its analysis of the governor’s revised spending plan, and it didn’t disappoint. First, the analysts said the administration’s projection of a $21 billion seems pretty spot-on. But the governor’s plan to borrow $6 billion? That’s “terrible precedent and poor fiscal policy,” the report said. And “it presents serious legal concerns.”

(The governor must have been reading. He just sent out a press release saying he’d drop the borrowing idea in favor of more cuts.)

To paraphrase the LAO: It’s time for the governor and the Legislature to get real and get busy whacking some serious costs. Then the analysts provided a helpful appendix of programs that could be trimmed or axed all together.

Here’s a list of some in the judicial branch and the attorney general’s office. If you listen closely, you can almost hear the sacred cows mooing over the Internet:

Eliminate the Underground Economy Program, a favorite of Attorney General Jerry Brown, for a savings of $600,000.

Reduce funding for the Bureau of Narcotics Enforcement in the Department of Justice ($20 million).

Replace court reporters with electronic recording devices ($45 million over two years).

Use competitive bidding to select court security forces ($60 million over two years – How fast can you say “Not gonna happen”?)

Siphon $550 million from the judiciary’s treasured courthouse construction fund into the state general fund over the next two years.

Repeal the statute giving judges’ automatic cost of living increases. ($500,000 a year)

Two other ideas floated: furlough state workers for a third day a month and eliminate the Office of Administrative Law.